Bain says plans to list Bellsystem in future
Bain Capital, which earlier this week announced a $1 billion acquisition of Bellsystem24 from Citigroup Inc, said it would look to list the Japanese telemarketer when it is ready to exit its investment.
Bellsystem was a very successfully traded public company, said David Gross-Loh, managing director at Bain Capital Japan in an interview on Thursday. Bain Capital is likely to consider listing Bellsystem24 in the future.
Bellsystem24 was listed until it was bought by Nikko Principal Investments, a private equity arm of Japanese brokerage group Nikko Cordial, which was later purchased by Citigroup.
Call centre industry has become more established in Japan as companies increasingly outsource this type of customer related service to focus on their core business, Gross-Loh said.
Citigroup said on Sunday it agreed to sell its stake in Japanese telemarketer Bellsystem24 to Bain Capital for 93.5 billion yen ($1 billion) in the largest private equity deals in Japan for foreign buyout firms in almost two years.
Bain has made a 79 billion yen worth of loans for the Bellsystem acquisition from Japan's three mega banks - Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Mizuho Financial Group and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, according to a person familiar with the buyout.
Bain Capital bought Bellsystem24 from its $1 billion fund targeting Asian companies. The fund still has about $500 million left, Gross-Loh said.
The U.S. fund will use money from its U.S. fund for Japanese and Asian acquisitions if necessary so fund availability does not constrain Bain Capital's business, he said.
We will be active and continue to pursue large deals in Japan, Gross-Loh added.
Bain Capital sees more deals worth more than $1 billion in Japan, he said, adding there were a few deals of this size every year in recent years and this trend will continue.
Japanese companies are facing a number of challenges in this difficult economic environment and are increasingly viewing private equity as a viable solution, he said.
(Reporting by Junko Fujita; editing by Elaine Hardcastle)
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